Systemic inflammation is a major factor influencing the outcome and quality of patient with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and acute exacerbations (AECOPD). Due to the inflammatory complexity, a great challenge is still confronted to optimize the identification and validation of disease-specific biomarkers.

The present study aimed at developing a new protocol of specific biomarker evaluation by integrating proteomic profiles of inflammatory mediators with clinical informatics in AECOPD patients, understand better their function and signal networks.

Methods: Plasma samples were collected from healthy non-smokers or patients with stable COPD (sCOPD) or AECOPD on days 1 and 3 of the admission and discharging day (day 7-10). Fouty chemokines were measured using a chemokine multiplex antibody array. Clinical informatics was achieved by a Digital Evaluation Score System (DESS) for assessing severity of patients. Chemokine data was compared among different groups and its correlation with DESS scores was performed by SPSS software.

Results: Of 40 chemokines, 30 showed significant difference between sCOPD patients and healthy controls, 16 between AECOPD patients and controls, and 13 between AECOPD patients and both sCOPD and controls, including BTC, IL-9,IL-18Bpa, CCL22,CCL23, CCL25, CCL28, CTACK, LIGHT, MSPa, MCP-3, MCP-4 and OPN. Of them, some had significant correlation with DESS scores.

Conclusion: There is a disease-specific profile of inflammatory mediators in COPD and AECOPD patients which may have a potential diagnostics together with clinical informatics of patients. Our preliminary study suggested that integration of proteomics with clinical informatics can be a new way to validate and optimize disease-special biomarkers.